SCC Recruits Health Economist

The Stephenson Cancer Center welcomes its newest recruit, a health economist with extensive experience in tobacco control research.

The Stephenson Cancer Center at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center welcomes its newest recruit, Ce Shang, Ph.D., a health economist with extensive experience in tobacco control research. Shang will also be an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.

Shang joins the cancer center from the University of Illinois at Chicago where she served as a Senior Research Scientist in the Institute for Health Research and Policy. At the University of Illinois, she studied under Frank Chaloupka, Ph.D., one of the nation’s foremost experts in the economics of tobacco control.

“We are thrilled to have Dr. Shang join our team,” said Jennifer Vidrine, Ph.D., Director of the Oklahoma Tobacco Research Center at the Stephenson Cancer Center. “Her research in tobacco regulatory science will play an important part of our mission to help end tobacco-related mortality in Oklahoma.”

Her research focuses on evaluating the effectiveness of tobacco control policies, including taxation and smoke-free air laws. In addition, Shang studies behavioral and experimental economics that explore tobacco-use behaviors and the impact of marketing and social media activities on tobacco use.

Shang holds external grants funded by organizations such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health. She is also the recipient of a NIH K99/R00 “Pathway to Independence Award” through the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

“Dr. Shang brings a wealth of knowledge in public health and policy,” said Theodore Wagener, Ph.D., Director of Tobacco Regulatory Science Research at the OTRC. “Her research will help Oklahoma better understand how policy and regulation impact tobacco use.”

Shang earned a Ph.D. in Economics from City University of New York in 2011. Her training includes health economics, public policy, behavioral economics, demography and global health.

The mission of the Oklahoma Tobacco Researcher Center is to reduce, and ultimately eliminate, tobacco-related mortality in Oklahoma through research that informs interventions and policies with a particular emphasis on addressing tobacco-related health disparities.

Shang’s recruitment is supported by funding from the Oklahoma Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust (TSET). An endowment created by the voters in 2000 to improve the health of Oklahomans, TSET is dedicated to reducing the state’s leading causes of preventable death – cancer and cardiovascular disease – caused by tobacco use and obesity.

Tobacco regulatory science plays an important role in helping policy makers better understand the impact of tobacco taxation and other regulation on tobacco usage and marketing. Oklahoma currently ranks 37th in the nation for tobacco use.